Polgara the Sorceress Page 10

  Take off your clothes, Polgara,’ she said quite firmly. ‘I need to see what I’m working with.’

  I actually blushed, but I did as she told me to.

  She studied my near naked body with pursed lips and a speculative eye. ‘Not too bad,’ she observed.

  That was hardly complimentary.

  ‘You’re lucky, Polgara,’ she told me. ‘Most girls your age are quite flat-chested. I think we might want to take advantage of that to draw attention away from the fact that you’re just a little hippy.’

  ‘I’m what?’ I exclaimed.

  ‘You were built to bear children, Polgara. It’s useful, but it makes your clothes hang all wrong.’

  ‘Is she telling me the truth?’ I asked Beldaran, speaking in ‘twin’ so that Arell couldn’t understand me.

  ‘You are sort of round down there, Pol,’ Beldaran replied. Then she grinned a naughty little grin at me. ‘If we cut your gown low enough in the back, we could show off the dimples on your bottom.’

  ‘I’ll get you for that, Beldaran,’ I threatened.

  ‘No you won’t, Pol,’ she said, stealing a favorite joke from uncle Beldin and our father. ‘You’re just saying that to make me feel better.’

  My gown was blue, and Arell’s design left my shoulders and a significant part of my upper torso bare. It was trimmed with snowy lace, and it was really a very nice gown. I almost choked when I first tried it on and looked at myself in the mirror, however. ‘I can’t wear this in public!’ I exclaimed. ‘I’m half naked!’

  ‘Don’t be such a goose, Polgara,’ Arell told me. ‘A well-designed gown’s supposed to highlight a woman’s best features. You’ve got a shapely bosom. I’m not going to let you hide it in a canvas bag.’

  ‘It really looks very nice, Pol,’ Beldaran assured me. ‘Nobody’s going to be looking at your hips if you wear that.’

  ‘I’m getting just a little tired of all this talk about hips, Beldaran,’ I said acidly. ‘You’re not exactly scrawny yourself, you know.’

  ‘The whole secret to wearing a daring dress is to be proud of what it reveals,’ Arell told me. ‘You’ve got a good figure. Flaunt it.’

  ‘This is Beldaran’s party, Arell,’ I protested. ‘She’s the one who’s supposed to attract attention, not me.’

  ‘Don’t be so coy, Polgara,’ she scolded me. ‘I’ve heard all about your little experiments in self-display in that large room down the hall, so don’t play innocent with me.’

  ‘At least I didn’t take my clothes off.’

  ‘You might as well have. Who designed those awful gowns you used to wear?’

  ‘Well – I needed a dress in Camaar, and father had a dressmaker sew one up for me. When we got here, I had another dressmaker copy it for the rest of them.’

  ‘I might have known,’ she sniffed. ‘Don’t ever let a Sendar design your clothes. They’re the prissiest people in the world. All right,’ she said then, ‘let’s get to work on the dresses for these other ladies.’ She squinted around at Beldaran’s attendants. ‘Green, I think,’ she mused. ‘We don’t want the dresses of the rest of the wedding party to clash with those of the bride and her sister.’

  I’ve sometimes wondered about Arell. She was just a bit too domineering to be entirely an Alorn lady. I think I’ll talk with mother about that. Mother’s not above tampering with people at times.

  Beldaran, of course, was nervous on the night before her wedding. It may not appear so, but brides are usually almost as nervous as grooms are on that particular night. Women are better at hiding things, though.

  ‘Don’t take it so seriously, Beldaran,’ Arell advised my sister. ‘A wedding’s a chance for others to enjoy themselves. The bride and groom aren’t much more than ornaments.’

  ‘I’m not feeling very ornamental right now, Arell,’ Beldaran replied. ‘Would you excuse me please? I think I’ll go throw up for a while.’

  The night passed, as nights are in the habit of doing, and the day dawned clear and sunny – a rarity on the Isle of the Winds. It’s a nice island, but it has an almost impossible climate.

  The wedding was scheduled for midday, largely because Alorn males celebrate on the night before a wedding, and they tend to feel a little delicate the following morning, so they need some time to pull themselves together.

  We had plenty to keep us busy, though. Beldaran took the ritual pre-nuptial bath, and when she emerged, her attendants anointed her gleaming body with rosewater. Then there was all the business with hair, and that consumed most of the rest of the morning. Then we all sat around in our undergarments to avoid wrinkling our gowns.

  At the last possible minute we all dressed, and Arell critically examined all of us. ‘It’ll do, I suppose,’ she noted. ‘Enjoy the wedding, girls. Now scoot.’

  We all trooped on down to the antechamber just outside the Hall of the Rivan King, where the wedding was to take place.

  I was a bit puzzled by my sister’s behavior once we entered that antechamber. She seemed almost inhumanly composed. All traces of her previous nervousness had vanished, and she seemed bemused and distant. Mother explained my sister’s detachment to me later. Much of what happened during the wedding was symbolic, and Beldaran was following some very precise instructions.

  I kept watch at the door, and so it was that I saw the arrival of Riva, his father, and his brothers.

  They were all dressed in chain mail, and there were swords bolted at their hips! I knew that Alorns were a warlike people, but really! In a sort of gesture to the formality of the occasion, their mail shirts were all brightly burnished. I hoped that they’d done something about the characteristic smell of armor, though. Armor of any kind has a very distinctive fragrance about it, and I didn’t think it’d be appropriate for all the ladies in Beldaran’s entourage to faint dead away during the ceremony.

  Then father joined us, and he didn’t smell too strongly of beer. I often make an issue of my father’s bad habits, but I’ll concede that he doesn’t really drink all that much. Evidently his years on the waterfront in Camaar had gotten most of that out of his system. ‘Good morning, ladies,’ he greeted us. ‘You all look quite beautiful. Are we ready?’

  ‘As ready as we’ll ever be, I suppose,’ I replied. ‘Did you manage to keep Riva sober last night?’

  ‘I didn’t have to, Pol. I watched him rather closely, and he hardly drank anything at all.’

  ‘An Alorn who doesn’t try to plunge headfirst into every beer barrel he passes? Amazing!’

  ‘Excuse me,’ he said then. ‘I need to talk with Beldaran. Beldin and I’ve made a few preparations she needs to know about.’

  I found out what he meant a little while later.

  My father has an exquisite sense of timing. He gave the crowd in Riva’s throne room some time to settle down, and then I quite clearly heard the thought he sent out to uncle Beldin. ‘All right,’ he said silently, ‘we might as well get started.’

  Uncle Beldin responded with a silvery fanfare played upon hundreds of phantom trumpets. The sound was impressive enough to silence all the wedding guests. The fanfare was followed by a wedding hymn sung very softly by an ethereal non-existent choir. I’m something of a musician myself, and I was enormously impressed by my dwarfed uncle’s complex harmony.

  Then at a signal from father, Beldaran went out through the door of the antechamber and stepped into the center of the doorway to the Hall of the Rivan King. She stood there, allowing herself to be admired, and then the Master bestowed his benediction upon her in the form of a beam of bright white light.

  When I think back on it, I realize now that the Master was blessing the entire Rivan line – the line that was to ultimately produce the Godslayer.

  I removed my cloak, and father’s eyes grew a little wild. ‘Nice dress,’ he noted from between clenched teeth. Sometimes my father’s very inconsistent. He admires the attributes of other ladies, but he grows quite upset when I display mine.

  We moved into place, one
on either side of Beldaran, and walked with stately pace down the aisle that led past the pits where burning peat provided warmth to the front, where Riva and his family awaited us.

  ‘It’s going quite well, don’t you think?’ Mother’s voice asked me.

  ‘It’s not over yet, mother,’ I replied. “These are Alorns, after all, so there’s still an enormous potential for disaster.’

  ‘Cynic,’ she accused.

  Then I noticed the Master’s Orb on the pommel of a massive sword hanging point down above the throne. It was a little hard to miss, since it glowed with an intensely blue fire.

  It was the first time I’d ever seen the Orb. I was impressed. I’ve seen that glow many times since then, but the only time I’ve ever seen it so bright was on the day when Garion took that sword down off the wall. In its own way the Orb was also blessing the wedding of Beldaran and Riva.

  When we reached the area just in front of the throne, my father and I surrendered custody of Beldaran over to Riva and stepped back a pace. The Rivan Deacon came forward at that point, and the ceremony began.

  My sister was radiant, and Riva’s worshipful eyes never left her face. Since this was a state wedding, the Rivan Deacon had expanded the ceremony extensively. Women, of course, absolutely love weddings. After the first hour, though, the wedding guests began to grow restless. The benches in the Hall of the Rivan King are made of stone, so they’re not really very comfortable for the ladies. The gentlemen were all looking forward to the extensive carousing that plays such an important part in Alorn weddings.

  Out of respect, however, we all managed to stifle our yawns.

  My sister and Riva endured the droning sermon of the ecclesiast lecturing them on the duties of marriage. I idly noted in passing that all the rights fell to the groom, and the duties and obligations were the bride’s domain.

  After another three quarters of an hour, the Deacon’s quickening cadence indicated that he was nearing his conclusion. He was a brave man; I’ll give him that. Every man in the hall was wearing a sword, and he’d tested the congregation’s patience to the limit.

  I’d stopped paying much attention to him a long time ago, and then mother’s voice inside my head made me very alert. ‘Polgara,’ she said, ‘keep a firm grip on your nerves.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Don’t get excited. Something’s going to happen to you at this point. It’s symbolic, but it’s quite important.’

  A moment later her meaning became very clear. I felt a gentle kind of warmth, and then I, like the Orb, began to glow a bright blue. Mother explained later that the glow was the Master’s benediction upon something which I would do at some point in the far distant future.

  ‘Listen very carefully, Polgara,’ mother’s voice said then. ‘This is the most important event in the history of the west. Beldaran’s the center of human attention, but the Gods are watching you.’

  ‘Me? What on earth for, mother?’

  ‘At the exact moment that Beldaran and Riva are declared man and wife, you’ll have to make a decision. The Gods have chosen you to be the instrument of their will, but you have to accept that.’

  ‘Accept what?’

  ‘A task, Polgara, and you must accept it or reject it right here and now.’

  ‘What kind of task?’

  ‘If you accept, you’ll be the guardian and protector of the line which descends from Beldaran and Riva.’

  ‘I’m not a soldier, mother.’

  ‘You’re not expected to be, Polgara. You won’t need a sword for this task. Consider your decision carefully, my daughter. When the task presents itself to you, you’ll recognize it immediately; and if you take it up, it’ll consume the rest of your life.’

  Then the Rivan Deacon finally arrived at his long-delayed climax.

  Above me I heard the ghostly flutter of soft wings just over my head, and I glanced upward. Mother, all snowy white, hovered in the still air, her huge golden eyes intent. Then she curved away from me and flew on soft wings to the rear of the hall to perch on one of the rafters.

  Then, as the Rivan Deacon pronounced the words that forever took my sister away from me, mother said, ‘Do you accept, Polgara?’

  The formality of her question demanded a formal response so I took the sides of my blue gown in my fingertips, spread the gown slightly, and curtsied my acceptance even as Riva kissed his new bride.

  ‘Done!’ And Done!’ A strange new voice exulted as Destiny claimed me for its own.

  Part Two:

  Father

  Chapter 6

  That was the first time I’d come into contact with what father chooses to call ‘Garion’s friend’, and I didn’t fully understand the source of that ‘Done! And Done!’ that rang so exultantly in my mind. It’s probably just as well that I didn’t, since no one is ever fully prepared for that first encounter with the Purpose of the Universe, and my collapsing in a dead faint might have disrupted my sister’s wedding just a bit.

  Following the ceremony, the wedding party and the guests all adjourned to the large banquet hall just down the corridor for the traditional wedding feast. Once we were settled on the benches at the groaning table where meat and fowl and all manner of delicacies awaited our attention, King Cherek Bear-shoulders rose to his feet. ‘My Lords and Ladies,’ he said, lifting his brimming ale-tankard, ‘I propose a toast to the bride and groom.’

  The assembled Alorns gravely and soberly rose to their feet, raised their tankards, and intoned, ‘The bride and groom!’ in unison.

  I thought that was rather nice.

  Then Dras Bull-neck proposed a toast to his father.

  Then Algar Fleet-foot proposed a toast to his brother Dras, and Bull-neck responded by toasting his brother Algar.

  The gravity of that Alorn assemblage was rapidly fading, and the sobriety faded right along with it. Just about everyone at the table seemed to feel obliged to honor somebody with a toast, and it was a very long table. As I recall, they never did get completely around it.

  ‘This is disgusting,’ I muttered to uncle Beldin, who was sitting beside me.

  Beldin, who was uncharacteristically clean – largely at Beldaran’s insistence – put on a look of pious innocence. ‘Surely you can’t object to the desire to honor those we love and respect, Pol,’ he said. ‘Excuse me a moment,’ he added. Then he stood up. ‘Ladies and gentlemen!’ he thundered, ‘I give you the Lady Polgara!’

  ‘Lady Polgara!’ They roared in unison, and they all drank deeply to me.

  At some point about midway through the banquet, Beldaran and Riva slipped away. The party grew progressively rowdier, and uncle Beldin was drinking everything in sight.

  I endured it for as long as I could, but then a bearded Alorn at the far end of the table rose unsteadily to his feet, spilled half his ale over the lady who sat beside him, and lifted his tankard. He belched. ‘Par’n me,’ he said absently. ‘Ladies an’ Gentleman, I give you my dog, Bowser!’

  To Bowser!’ they all shouted enthusiastically, and then they drank.

  That did it! I stood up.

  To whom did you want to drink, Pol?’ Beldin asked, his eyes unfocused and his speech slurred.

  I know I shouldn’t have done it, and I apologized profusely the next morning, but I was just a little irritated at that point. ‘Why to you, of course, uncle dear,’ I replied sweetly. ‘My Lords and Ladies,’ I announced, ‘I give you my dear, dear uncle Beldin.’

  And then I poured a tankard of ale on his head and stormed out of the banquet hall, followed by the rest of the ladies.

  Alorns have an enormous capacity for strong ale, so their celebration lasted for three days.

  I chose not to attend.

  On the morning of the fourth day after the wedding, father stopped by my rooms. We chatted for a while, and then Cherek Bear-shoulders was admitted. Cherek looked decidedly unwell, but he seemed to be more or less sober. ‘I was talking with Dras and Algar this morning,’ he said, ‘and Algar thought we might
want to get together to exchange some information. We don’t have much chance to meet and talk very often, and there’s a lot going on in the world.’

  ‘Probably not a bad idea,’ father agreed. ‘Why don’t you go get Riva, and I’ll see if I can locate Beldin.’ He squinted at me. ‘Why don’t you join us as well, Pol?’ he suggested.

  ‘What on earth for?’

  ‘For my peace of mind, daughter dear,’ he said somewhat pointedly.

  ‘It shall be as my father commands,’ I replied with feigned obedience.

  ‘She has beautiful manners, doesn’t she?’ Cherek noted.

  ‘Don’t make such hasty judgments, Cherek,’ father warned him.

  And so it was that I sat in on the first sessions of what came to be known as ‘the Alorn Council’. At the outset I only sat in the background and listened. The main topic of discussion was the presence of Angaraks on this side of the Sea of the East, and I didn’t really know very much about Angaraks.

  I’d been a bit apprehensive about being in such close proximity to Dras and Algar, fearing that one – or both – might seize this opportunity to press unwelcome suits. That was when I discovered that kings probably don’t make very good husbands, since when politics rears its head, a king becomes all business. Dras and Algar had obviously stopped thinking of me as a woman. For them I was simply another council member.

  My isolated childhood had not prepared me for the concept of racial differences, and I’m not talking here about purely physical differences. Alorns tend to be tall and blond, while Tolnedrans tend to be short and dark. All other differences are largely cultural. Alorns are encouraged to enjoy a good fight, while Tolnedrans are encouraged to make money. I discovered early on in the discussions that Angaraks are encouraged to be afraid of Torak – and by extension of his Grolim priesthood. Despite some superficial differences, there’s a Thull lurking at the bottom of every Angarak soul.

  So long as Torak’s people had remained in Mallorea, they’d posed no real threat, but now that the Murgos, Nadraks, and Thulls had crossed the land bridge, the Alorns felt that it was time to stop just talking about the Angaraks and to start doing something about them.